In Fair Verona
Chapter Four
Mercedes is naked.
Almost.
Kendall's got the shape of one of her perfect breasts cupped in his palm, his other hand gripping her hip while he drags his dick painstakingly slow across the lacy cloth of her black panties. He can feel her, damp heat, and her thighs press into his hips. Her fingernails are digging into the muscle of his shoulder blades, her nipple standing at attention beneath his thumb, and he's in the middle of imagining how easy it would be to just nudge the fabric aside and fuck into her, wet and tight and all for him.
That's about when the door creaks open.
Not that Kendall hears it. He's still lost in the smell of Mercedes's hair and the heat between her legs, wondering if the mood will dissipate if he takes her panties off with his teeth. Mercedes is the one who sees the outline of light spilling in from the hallway, the one who gasps, "Daddy?"
And Kendall is all for dirty talk, but he's always found the Electra Complex thing a little weird. He mumbles, "That's not hot, babe."
She shoves him off of her, grabbing for the comforter. Clutching it close to her chest, she hisses, "No you idiot. It's my dad."
Kendall's head turns so quick he might have the first honest case of whiplash America has seen since gas stations went out of business.
Griffin is wrapped in a terrycloth robe that's plusher than anything that Kendall has ever seen outside of this ridiculous house, with its extravagant wealth. He's tall and intimidating and every bit as scary as Kendall remembers, but he also looks tired, like Christmas decorations left out well past Easter. For the briefest of moments, Kendall considers his gun, only feet away on Mercedes's bedside table.
He's not crazy enough to do it.
Just barely.
Griffin shades his eyes with his hand. His warrior-frame is shadowed and dark, and he lets out a long sigh. He announces, "This is unexpected."
Red is creeping up Kendall's chest, staining his ears and his cheeks, but Griffin is practical. He says, "I'm going to let you two put clothes on and try to erase this emotionally scarring visual from my mind. Come down to the dining room when you're not naked. We'll talk. …It will be awkward."
As soon as he leaves, Mercedes gathers up her nightgown, muttering, "Shit. Shit. Shit. Fuck. Shit."
Kendall agrees with the sentiment, but his throat has gone dry. He doesn't think he could form words if he wanted to. He shimmies into his jeans and starts a scavenger hunt for his shirt, that stupid Hawaiian number that James gave him.
James is going to murder him if he dies.
It's a weird thought to have, but it keeps Kendall occupied all the way down the stairs he's only braved once or twice before, with Mercedes in the middle of the day; when Griffin was definitely, certainly, most assuredly out and there was no danger of getting caught.
Now they're trapped.
He keeps imagining a rope tightening around his neck. He can taste fear in the back of his throat, sharp and wet, like he's swallowed sewage. Don't pussy out, he tells himself. Kendall can't run away screaming and leave Mercedes to face this alone. No matter how tempting it sounds.
In the ornate dining room, there is tea, all set out in dainty china cups with a blue pattern around the rim. Griffin, sitting at the head of a long mahogany table, sees Kendall looking and says, "My ex-wife picked out the pattern. We divorced before the Fall. I think she was in Florida when it all went down."
He says it conversationally, like he's not actually hiding a shotgun under his chair, and Kendall's not sure if it's a good sign or not.
"Is she okay?" Kendall asks Mercedes, because he can't actually bring himself to meet her father's eyes, and Mercedes shrugs.
"She was ex number six. Who cares?"
Griffin takes a sip of his tea. Kendall slides into the chair Griffin indicates for him and sniffs his, wondering if that's a whiff of poison he detects, or just chamomile. Mercedes sits more rigid than he's ever seen her, back ramrod straight, hands primly folded in her lap.
She won't even look at her teacup.
Griffins begins, "I'm thinking January."
"January?" Kendall repeats numbly.
"Mmm," Griffin hums. "Any sooner and we'll be sending the wrong message; we don't want anyone to think my daughter's a strumpet." He reaches across the table and pats her stomach. Mercedes frowns. "Any later and who knows? We might end up with evidence of the same. I trust this hasn't been going on long?"
Griffin's gaze turns sharp, and Kendall wishes he could melt into his chair, let his fear turn him liquid. Instead he tries to maintain eye contact, to look braver than he feels.
"That's not any of your business, daddy. And what are you talking about?" Mercedes huffs, finally deigning to take a sip of tea.
"Making the best out of a situation that isn't exactly ideal." Griffin folds his hands together, forever a businessman. He looks every bit as stern and authoritative in his robe as he did the day of Kendall's interview. His eyes are steel. "You two are getting married."
"Married?" Mercedes chokes on chamomile, spitting half of it onto the table and Kendall.
"Married?" Kendall's mind goes blank. He can feel a stray droplet of tea roll down his cheek, but he leaves it, lets it trace a line down to his jaw, his neck, and settle in the hollow above his collarbone.
"Daddy, marriage is a little drastic."
"Marriage is the only solution," Griffin replies. "Half the country's in craters. You two are lucky you even have the option-"
"Option? Forcing a wedding isn't a choice," Mercedes says, slamming her hand down on the table. The china quakes. Kendall bunches his fingers in the leg of his jeans.
"It's the only choice you have."
Mercedes crosses her arms. Griffin's gaze is burning, but so is hers. Kendall tries to remember that her stubbornness is a thing he likes about her.
He can't breathe.
"There's no law that I have to marry every boy I sleep with."
Griffin's eyes narrow, candlelight flickering against his obsidian pupils. He looks like a demon, dressed in red, prepared to maim and torture. "Why not this one? You turned down Dak, you turned down the last suitor-"
"Dak was only with me for a promotion, and Jett is a pompous idiot," Mercedes snaps. Her crimson nails dig into the teacup, talon-like.
"Exactly. This boy is employed by me, chosen by you. I imagine you feel…something for him, heavens know why. You've only got a year to go before…." Griffin's voice turns firm and he says, "There are twice as many men as women in this city."
"So?" Mercedes snaps.
"So, I won't have them fighting over you when the time comes. At least this way…It's a mercy, Mercy." Griffin pats her hand, but she snatches it away and looks like she's seriously considering throwing her tea in his face. He says, "This isn't a negotiation."
Mercedes's chair screams as she shoves away from the table. She's on her feet, saying, "You can't force me to get married."
"I can do whatever I want. I'm Arthur Griffin." Mercedes's face begins to turn red, a kind of fury that Kendall has never seen creeping up the line of her delicate throat. Griffin looks at Kendall. "You. It would be wise if you leave. I expect you back here in the morning."
"Gustavo-"
"Gustavo works for me. He can wait."
Kendall doesn't exactly plan on abandoning ship, but the next thing he knows he is out of his seat and Griffin is guiding him straight to the front door while Mercedes narrowly misses both their heads with that fine china teacup. Chamomile splashes against Kendall's shoulders, soaking through his shirt, and there might be a cut from a stray shard on his face.
He wants to ask if Griffin's really, actually serious, and he wants to ask if Mercedes is going to be okay. But he doesn't ask any of that, because Griffin slams the door in Kendall's face.
Kendall groans. Why is he such an idiot?
He just assumed that they wouldn't get caught. He felt invincible, and now it kind of sucks hard to realize that he's really, really not. He touches his hand against the marbled wall behind the trellis. It's cold, like a cage, like a coffin.
Kendall is so screwed.
On the way home, he focuses on the pastel houses on the main drag; the pink of a wilted rose petal, the orangey saffron of corrosion and mold, the lavender of corpse skin and the clouded indigo of the smog in the sky. A broken red brick shingle crunches under his foot. He can see the rusty color crumbling beneath his sneaker.
He can also see that there is a dead girl on the corner of the street. He nearly misses her, except for the shingle redirecting his gaze. And the smell. Rotting meat is kind of a particular stench, a sickly sweet thing that catches in a person's nose and won't leave, not ever.
It haunts Kendall's dreams, sometimes. The girl will too.
A bird's nest is growing inside of her ribcage. He realizes this must have been the woman who was executed a while back, the spectacle he refused to attend. She does not have much skin left to rot, half mummified from the sun, half scavenged by the gulls. Kendall does not look at the awkward angles of her limbs, the mottled sheen of what flesh remains or the way her ribs warp whenever the birds in the nest move.
He does not look, but he sees all the same. The moonlight is too bright, and the night is too clear. It's not all that late yet.
Maybe that was his mistake, getting loud and sweaty and obscene when night hadn't completely blanketed the city.
Like the dead girl, Kendall tries not to focus on it, because when he does, all he can feel is this overpowering hysteria that feels like it might burst from his skin, punch holes through the marrow of his bones and spill out into the world like a scream.
It's just a wedding.
It's just a ring. But it feels like more than that, like a weighty shackle that will tie him to Mercedes and Griffin for the rest of his life when really, he wants more than this. Even if it's impossible, Kendall's been holding on to the vague idea that one day he might be able to find something else, to be more than one of Griffin's dumb henchmen. He's better than grunt work. He's better than this whole damn city, and so are James, Carlos, and Logan. Up until now, he refused to let any of it drag any of them down. But if he commits himself to Mercedes, he won't be able to leave.
Not ever. Through the whole damn collapse of civilization, loyalty is one of the only virtues he's been able to hold onto. He's not planning on letting that go, no matter how unhappy it makes him.
The guys are going to kill him.
James is going to kill him.
Kendall swallows and walks on. He presses his fingertips into the curve of his eyelids and wonders how bad this is going to be. When they were little, before things went bad, James was his world. Kendall didn't really befriend Carlos until the first grade, when they got involved in peewee hockey, because things had only just begun to sour, and Kendall's mom and Carlos's dad still thought peewee hockey was something worth pursuing. Logan didn't move to town until the third grade, when his family was trying to escape the chaos in the South.
Before them, Kendall only had James, a million different versions of his smile and his laugh and all of his bizarre poses. He knew every facet of James's stubbornness and every dream that flitted through his head. And Kendall always thought he'd be able to make every single one come true.
The Fall changed things, stole away people they all loved and forged bonds of trust and devotion that ran deeper than anything a normal friendship could have been. It changed James, turned him from this pretty little boy who wanted to grow up to be a popstar into a renegade, this badass rebel without a clue that Kendall doesn't always understand or agree with. But impossibly, Kendall still feels like the same little boy he was at age five, who wants to give James everything he ever wanted, and who is scared to death of disappointing the coolest kid he knows.
There is a song in the air, drifting down from one of the open windows. Kendall isn't sure if that's city housing or not, but he isn't going to judge anyone for living where they're not supposed to. He listens, hums along a little. The music sits inside his chest, melts into his heart, and makes him feel just the tiniest bit better.
That's what music is all about, after all; lifting a person up when they've crashed so low they have nowhere left to go.
Kendall gets home when the moon has peaked in the sky, starlight lancing through a lazy drift of clouds so dark and gray that they blend into the night. His trek up the stairs to their crappy squatter's hole of an apartment is weary, and all that Kendall really wants is to sleep for a thousand years.
He does not want to deal with James, and yet another of his stupid dates.
James keeps bringing home girls, all shapes, all sizes, like he's trying to impress upon Kendall the importance of variety, and how it's the spice of life. This one's got alabaster skin that must be hard as hell to maintain in the middle of California and silvery blonde hair that disappears into the collar of James's oversized t-shirt. She pads across the living room with a coy smile, bends down, and okay, she's not wearing anything under the shirt. All Kendall can see at the top of the stairs is the muscle of her thighs and the shape of her ass as she dips in and kisses James.
He tries not to gag, but a tiny, displeased noise erupts from his mouth.
The girl shoots up like a rocket, but all James does is kiss the girl's inner thigh, peering out at Kendall's shadowy form from between her legs.
Kendall's breath speeds up. He tries to act casual, kicking off his shoes and saying, "Honey, I'm home."
There is this beat, and then two, where James doesn't move, his lips still pressed to skin, his eyes still glued to Kendall. Then he pulls back and says cheerfully, "Just in time to meet my new friend. Isn't she great?"
James grins and smacks the girl's ass. The sound echoes in the still of the apartment. Kendall walks up next to them both, sizing up the blonde with her tiny frame and her regal features. She smiles, too chipper for how Kendall feels, and hops onto James's lap.
Kendall sighs.
"Nifty," he says, less sarcastic and more exhausted. He's not exactly in the mood for any of this.
James's expression softens, melts into a more familiar kind of worry. "Everything okay?"
"Sure." Kendall shrugs. "Magnificent."
He wants to tell James everything, but he can't, not with James's bimbo perched on his lap, and not without Logan or Carlos listening in. This isn't a conversation Kendall plans on having to repeat. He pulls away, intent on stumbling into the bedroom and crashing for good, until morning and the harsh glare of sunlight and his impending doom.
James grabs his wrist, finger tracing one of the blue veins beneath his skin. Kendall shivers into it, ticklish, tingly. James says, "If you need to talk…"
"Hey, you're on a date," Kendall replies with the fakest of fake upbeat attitudes. "Don't let me interrupt."
"I, uh." James looks guiltily at the girl, his great girl, and decides, "She was just leaving."
"James, don't-" Kendall protests, but James goes through the whole tricky process of kicking his date out without making her hate him. Kendall has no idea how James has managed to perfect that whole routine. Every time he tries it he ends up with a drink to the face, or worse. All James gets is a kiss to the cheek and a coy see you soon?
Once she's gone, James buckles up the front of his jeans and scooches over on the couch.
Kendall wouldn't have minded if he had left himself all rumpled and untucked. He looked good that way, pulled at something bittersweet in the depths of Kendall's stomach.
"What's wrong?" James enunciates, patting the sofa. Kendall slumps into the space, soaking up the heat James has left behind. He pulls his knees into his chest, and James takes hold of one of his bare feet, rubbing the sole.
"That tickles," Kendall says. James rolls his eyes. He stops rubbing, but he doesn't let go, his big palm wrapped around Kendall's foot, their shoulders pressed together.
Kendall focuses on the points of heat and wonders if maybe he should tell James now. It's not like waiting until tomorrow will make it all better. Just.
Day makes it easier to face things, sometimes. And if Kendall says something now, James will stop touching him. He'll go chase down that girl, Kendall thinks, and he doesn't want that. The idea of it makes his muscles pinch.
Kendall's pissed and upset and hiding it all beneath his tired smile, and right now all he wants is this; the dim light of their living room and the points of electricity where James is touching him. He asks, "Can I tell you in the morning?"
James's forehead furrows, but he says, "You know I'm always here."
Kendall nods, but inside he's worried. How does James define always?
Kendall supposes he'll find out tomorrow.
Mercedes doesn't manage to talk Griffin out of anything, and Kendall feels stupid for hoping that she would. He spends his morning sitting stiffly at her side while Griffin discusses his six month timeline.
"The engagement party comes first," he says, and Mercedes nods along. She smiles, even.
It does not reach her eyes.
Afterwards, Kendall trudges back home with heavy feet. He's got an engagement party at the end of the week. Now he has no choice but to tell the guys how badly he's fucked up. This is going to be all over Verona by nightfall, and if Kendall doesn't break the news to them, he'll get the silent treatment until the fucking wedding.
It's that weird in-between time when Logan is just back from the apothecary, but Carlos hasn't run off to the cabaret, and they're all together. Just like it used to be.
Right down to how Carlos is about to blow something up on their kitchen counter. Logan is teaching him how to slop together some kind of recipe over a homemade Bunsen burner, and whatever it is bubbles wildly in a giant steel pot. James is watching from the sofa, a safe distance away, amusement quirking his lips and tilting his eyes.
He lights up when Kendall walks in the door and says, "You're home early!"
Kendall can't manage a smile in return. Carlos is here. Logan is here. James is here.
No time like the present.
"So." Kendall looks at his friends. They stare back, expectant. Carlos's hand hovers in the air, a glass jar of some herb or another perched in his fingers. Logan's got his arm crossed, a wrinkled recipe paper clutched in one hand. James is splayed out lazy and comfortable on the couch. His eyes are the color of jasper, and Kendall still really doesn't want to tell him.
He doesn't want those eyes to turn hard at the edges.
He doesn't want James to hate him.
Kendall takes a deep breath. "I'm getting married. Uh. To Mercedes."
He wants silence. He wants the dramatic pause that's supposed to meet announcements with this kind of gravity. Instead, James's reaction is immediate. "What?"
"Griffin caught us. Together," Kendall explains, like that part isn't obvious. "Now we're getting hitched. The, um, engagement party is this weekend. At Griffin's. There will be champagne."
Because real, legitimate alcohol that wasn't cooked up in a bathtub will obviously make everything better.
Except not. James is still staring at Kendall like maybe he's threatened to stab him in the back with his own sword. Emphatically, he says, "You can't."
Slowly, Kendall replies, "I don't have any choice."
Carlos, ever the peacemaker, jumps in to save the day. "It could be worse. Mercedes is a babe, and you like her, right?"
"I guess. I mean, no, yeah. Of course I like her. Just, you know. Marriage. It's a little…soon," Kendall decides diplomatically. "It could be good. Maybe."
Carefully, Logan uncrosses his arms. "Come on. Do you really want to marry Mercedes?"
"Not particularly," Kendall enunciates, holding his hands out in a helpless gesture. "But what am I supposed to do? Griffin will fire me if I break his daughter's heart. Or worse. Probably worse."
"How do you know you're going to break her heart? You're not exactly a catch," Logan snipes and now his eye is half on the yellowed recipe paper Carlos is working off of.
"I'll have you know I'm a total stud," Kendall says. He can't exactly keep a straight face while doing it. Kendall plops on the couch next to James and buries his sardonic, slightly maniacal grin in one of Logan's dumb, musty throw pillows. He ignores the way that James flinches away and asks, "What am I supposed to do?"
"Nut up," Carlos suggests sunnily.
"Tell Mercedes," James says, an uncharacteristically quiet edge to his voice. "Maybe she can help."
"I can't tell Mercedes I don't want to marry her."
"Really? You're the one who thinks honesty is like, the one true path or whatever."
Logan wrinkles his nose. "There's honest and there's cruel. Mercedes is…vain…loud, spoiled…."
"Rich," Carlos throws in.
James doesn't say anything at all. Kendall nudges his knee with his foot, but James just scoots even further away. Kendall's shoulders slump and he hugs the pillow close to his chest. "She's nice. Mercedes is nice. And I have to get married eventually, right?"
Carlos shrugs noncommittally and turns back to his recipe. Logan mouths civic duty and nods.
But James.
James does not look pleased. "So love, what? Doesn't even matter?"
"It matters. Of course it matters," Kendall feels something hot and angry spike through his chest. Has James already completely forgotten how devastated he was by Jo? James's eyes blaze. He is angry, and Kendall knew he would be, but geez. It's not like Kendall is exactly super pleased about the prospect of his impending nuptials either. What does James expect him to do about it?
He watches his friend hop to his feet and gather up his shit.
"I'm going out." James says, his leather jacket dangling over his arm.
"Where?"
"What does it matter to you? You've got a wedding to plan." James storms out of the apartment, crashes down the stairs, and slams the front door. Kendall winces.
He says to Logan and Carlos, "It won't change us, I swear."
"Kendall," Logan says, over the top of the billowing gray cloud Carlos has just created. "I don't know if you get to promise that."
James brings home a girl. Kendall knows because he wakes up in the middle of the night, sprawled across one of the two moldy old futons the guys share, Logan tucked into his side. His mouth is dry, and he has this idle idea that he'll grab some water from one of the plastic jugs they keep next to the useless kitchen sink.
He disentangles himself from Logan's baby-lemur grip, used to it from a hundred nights on the road, where they all slept piled together like puppies. That's when he sees James and his date, tangled and naked on the ratty old sofa in the living room.
Kendall stares at the long, golden line of James's spine, dimpled where bone protrudes for a long, long time.
James brought the girl home on purpose.
To hurt him.
Kendall understands that with a kind of cold certainty that he doesn't actually understand at all, that he can't figure out, because why would James do that?
And why is it working? Kendall feels like yanking the girl up by the hair and throwing her out. There is heat under his skin, an itch he can't shake, can't reach. Almost against his will, he reaches out and trails a finger along the lean lines of James's back. James shivers and arches into the girl, sleepily snuggling into her neck. Into her throat, he mumbles something Kendall can't quite hear.
Kendall says, "You're so dumb sometimes."
Come to think of it, that probably applies to the both of them.
The engagement party is held in Griffin's ballroom. Because his house is so fucking big it has a ballroom. The guys show up late- confused by their bowties and fancy suits and what exactly to do with a cummerbund- tumbling over each other like puppies, trying to make it in the entrance first.
James wins.
"Classy place." He whistles, taking in the Rococo architecture, the gilded ceiling and the shining, ornate chandelier. There are mirrors on every wall, throwing Kendall's pale reflection back at him from every angle.
"Least you're marrying up," Carlos agrees, swinging an arm around Kendall's shoulders. He nuzzles his neck, all happy, open affection, regardless of who might be watching. James shoves him back by his forehead, and Logan ropes his arms around Carlos's waist.
"Mind your manners."
"Don't want anyone to think you're a sodomizer," a voice adds cheerfully.
Dak.
Fuck.
"What are you doing here?" Kendall asks, shifting from foot to foot. His dress shoes are too tight, even though Griffin's private tailor outfitted him personally. He feels like a little boy, playing dress up. A string quartet strikes up a jaunty tune. It makes Kendall's skin thrum.
"I'm the greeter. Greetings." Dak gives them a cheesy formal bow. "Congrats on scoring the boss-man's daughter."
It doesn't sound malicious, but Kendall can't help taking it that way. He just really doesn't like Dak. At all. "Thanks."
"I like you, Knight. You're spunky." Dak grins this supserstar grin that probably would have landed him in the movies, if there were still anyone making 'em. Then that smile turns razor sharp, and he adds, "But I do what I'm told. Just a heads up…If Griffin ever wants me to cut you down, I'm going to do it."
Dak pats Kendall on the shoulder like they're friends now, when mostly Kendall wants to pistol whip him across the face. If only his gun hadn't been checked at the door by some Councilmen acting as security. He grits his teeth and tries to remember that he's at a high profile event.
Being thrown in his own honor.
"I'd behave yourself with Mercedes. Oh, hey, it's Kelly." Dak brushes by the lot of them and goes to greet Kelly.
Logan says, "That guy is a douchebag."
"Yep." Kendall pops his lips together and blows out. This is going to be a long night.
There are more people gathered in that big ballroom than Kendall has ever seen outside of the flea markets, and there is not a dirty cheek amongst them. The women are butterflies, dressed in jewel toned ball gowns, and the men wear tuxes and suits that look like they walked right off a silver screen.
And back to those women, man, Kendall has never seen so many in one place. Carlos and Logan's eyes are bugging out of their heads, and even James looks relatively interested, like he hasn't probably already nailed half of the ladies there.
"Guys, behave," Kendall hisses, already sensing that it's a necessary warning.
Coolly, Camille drawls, "Like they even know how."
Kendall turns on his foot, nearly tripping over the hem of his slacks. He didn't hear her approach, but that's not exactly new. "Camille."
What is new are the heels. She's wearing a dress the color of azaleas, bright pink with a lot of beading and sparkle. She is gorgeous. James, Logan, and Carlos rush over one another to say hi.
Camille laughs. "Hey, boys. Mind if I talk to Kendall?"
"M'lady," James steps back, all gallant and dorky.
Logan glares. He says brightly, "You look-"
"I'm not talking to you," Camille replies. She's still pissed about that night a few weeks back, which, whatever, she has every right to be. Kendall allows her to lead him a few feet away, towards the bar set up near the front of the room. He ignores the distraught look on Logan's face and engulfs Camille in a hug. "Don't you clean up nice?"
"You're freaking out, aren't you?" Camille asks shrewdly.
"It's that obvious?" Kendall fiddles with his collar. Camille reaches out and stills his hands.
"Oh yeah. Want to back out?"
"I would if I could," Kendall replies, darting nervous glances left and right.
"What's the worst Griffin can do? Kill you? You could run. Get out of the city. I'll help."
Kendall allows himself a minute to consider the idea, but he knows what his answer has to be. "What's the point? If I do this, if I marry her, we'll be set for life. We won't have to worry about food or protection or- I can take care of James and Carlos and Logan. I can take care of you."
"I don't need to be taken care of," Camille replies automatically. "And that's not a good enough reason to commit yourself to this. If you're not going to be happy, what's the point?"
"The point is, we've got a life here. I'm not going to drag any of you down with me."
"Kendall-"
"Look, we can't do this here. Let's just-" Kendall wends an arm around her shoulders and guides her back to the boys. "Try to smile."
Logan opens his mouth, but before he can get anything else, Camille extricates herself from Kendall's grip. "James. Want to dance?"
Camille tugs on his arm and pulls him out onto the floor. James has the nerve to look a little nervous about it.
When they first came to Verona, Logan and James fell all over their own feet trying to attract Camille's attention. And Logan was the one who did it, who pulled her in with his schoolboy charm and his dimpled smile. It annoyed the hell out of James, who is not used to losing. On the floor, his hands settle on Camille's hips and he looks acutely uncomfortable. So does she, for that matter. There has always been this thing between them, this tension that makes the air shimmer whenever they're close. Kendall wonders if he thinks he's got a second chance, now.
The idea makes him feel vaguely sick, like most things involving James do these days. He focuses on Logan, who is staring wistfully at Camille's back. "Sometime I'm going to learn how to act like a human being around her again."
Carefully, Kendall states, "That's probably a good goal."
"I miss her."
"You've got a shitty way of showing it."
"I know. Trust me, I know." He shoves his hands in the pockets of his slacks while Carlos pats his shoulder sympathetically. "Drinks?"
"I'd love to," Kendall says. "But, uh. I think I found my date."
Mercedes is across the room, clad in this strapless ivory confection of tulle and crystal beading. She is beautiful, because she is always beautiful. Kendall knows that's what got him into trouble in the first place. He crosses the room and wraps his arms around her shoulders. A little awkwardly, he says, "You, uh. You look really pretty."
He's not sure how to act around Mercedes now that their relationship is supposed to mean something other than a good time; friendship and sex and laughter. He cares about her, loves her even, but he doesn't know her. Not really.
Not well enough that he's ready to commit to her for the rest of his life.
"Oh, do I? Want me to bend over and curtsy?" Mercedes murmurs, flipping up her skirt until Kendall can see the white of her thighs.
"Hey, hey. Later," he murmurs, laughing a little, because at the very least, this crazy girl knows how to defuse a tense situation, quick. She turns in the circle of his arms.
"I didn't mean for this to happen." She says into his shoulder. "I'm sorry."
"Hey, hey." Kendall grazes his lips against her cheek, and she looks up, meets his eyes. "It's not your fault."
"I was careless-"
"We were both careless," Kendall corrects. "You didn't force me into anything. Don't try to take all the blame."
James and Camille dance by them, Camille's long, bright skirt billowing out like the petals of a tigerlily, and Kendall catches a whiff of James's cologne. His stomach knots. James sees Kendall staring and waves, obnoxiously, behind Camille's back.
She punches him in the arm and he winces.
"Dance?" Kendall suggests to Mercedes, because they can't just stand there, holding each other all night. They have to at least pretend this is what they want.
Mercedes shrugs and counters, "Drink?"
That sounds like a way better plan. Kendall and Mercedes join Carlos in Logan in downing shots of honeyed vodka at the bar, drinking flutes of champagne and mixed cocktails that taste like sunlight. The liquor makes their feet move, and then Mercedes finally accepts Kendall's invitation, one song after another that he learns the steps to as he goes. They shimmy and shake their way through throngs of powerful, important people, wave to Griffin and his rich friends as they spin past. They switch partners, and Kendall meets some of Mercedes's lackeys; girls he's vaguely familiar with from long summer nights whiled away at L'Amour.
Nearly five songs in, a gleeful tantarella turns into something different, a Parisian waltz that is too slow for the adrenaline in Kendall's bloodstream. He slips to the right, a graceless chassé meant to extricate him from the grip of one of Mercedes's overeager friends, but all it does is deliver him straight into James's arms.
"Going somewhere?" James has got him trapped like a wiggly puppy or a fidgety toddler; sometimes Kendall forgets that James has always been stronger than him. He laughs when Kendall tries to shove him away, pulls him close and intimate, and a few of the men dancing by with their dates snicker and tell him that he's going to make such a pretty wife.
"Get off," Kendall tells him, scared, scared, always scared of something he doesn't entirely understand. He doesn't have any reason to be afraid.
He's never had a reason to be afraid, not of the hangman's rope when there are so many other things in this world to fear. But sometimes he looks at James, and from the gold-auburn light that catches in his hair to the color of his eyes, like the green-black-brown of apache tears, Kendall feels nothing but panic.
James pulls him in tighter, twirls him around to sweet notes on a piano that reverberate in Kendall's chest and make him feel like his bones have turned to ivory keys that the musicians can play just as well as the cello or the viola. Everywhere James touches creates electricity across the surface of Kendall's skin, and that is all he is, anymore, electric currents and hollow bones that sing, sing, sing,
James and the music make his whole body sing.
His heart kicks up in his chest, echoing the music, the footsteps of the dancers, the rhythm of James's breath. There is this roaring sound in his ears, waves, or the sound of a jet engine, but it makes no sense because there hasn't been a plane in the sky for years. James presses a hand low on Kendall's spine, fingers dipping beneath the waistband of his slacks. He guides Kendall in a circle, taking the lead. Around them, the most powerful men in Verona are laughing like it's all a big joke, but Kendall's face is flushed with red, and James's is too. Together they are the strings of a violin, wound too tight. Every note between them is discordant and loud, every breath harsh and uncertain.
And then it's over.
The music signals a change of partners, and James goes back to Camille, and Kendall returns to Mercedes, finally, and everyone has their laughs in for the night.
"Kendall? What's wrong?" Mercedes asks, her smirk dropping from her lips. She looks genuinely concerned, and Kendall is an awful person. Like a truly horrible, awful person.
Because nothing is wrong, exactly, except that everything is wrong. That wasn't a joke to him. That was his heart racing and his body yearning and his entire being focused on one thing; the place where James's fingers rested against his spine.
Griffin approaches him what feels like hours later, Gustavo at his heels. The party is not even close to wending down, although the moon has already grown small in the sky. Kendall is on his eighth shot of honey vodka and feels like he has fire in his veins.
"Can you sing?" Griffin demands.
What kind of question is that? "Sir?"
Mercedes laughs softly in Kendall's ear.
"Can you sing?" Griffin repeats in this tone of voice that makes it obvious his patience is wearing thin.
"He can sing," Gustavo confirms, offhand, more focused on his champagne flute than what's actually happening. Kendall thinks of snatching the drink away.
"I'm asking him," Griffin says steadily.
"I can't." Kendall protests.
"Sure you can. You're constantly humming, and like Kelly said, you're on key, mostly." Gustavo shrugs. "Just add some words."
"But why do I have to?" Kendall asks slowly, and he can't help it if his tone of voice implies that he'd rather not, please.
"Family tradition," Mercedes breaks in. "The prospective groom is supposed to sing a toast."
Kendall's drunk enough that he caves, that he convinces Carlos and Logan and James to stand in the middle of the room with him and belt out a ballad for his new fiancée.
Music is an idea, a concept that sits on his shoulders and lives on his chest. It is words, woven into a magic spell, but also notes and melodies that make his ribcage tremble. It feathers along his skin and grows there, wings he does not quite know how to use. But he thinks he would very much like to learn, to let it shiver through him until he is soaring, brilliant, bright. Kendall lets the song build inside of him like a glow, trades it back and forth with Carlos and Logan and James until the four of them are in perfect harmony. They're in sync, because they always are, belonging solely to each other since the day they fled Minnesota.
When it's done, there is applause. There is Griffin actually smiling and joking, "Why aren't they on the radio?"
And there is James beaming, his happiness dazzling. At his side, Logan and Carlos share a covert fist bump.
"They were alright," Gustavo allows.
"Alright? They were amazing!" Mercedes throws her arms around Kendall's neck. "Sexy and talented."
She kisses Kendall right on the lips, and James's smile drops off of his face.
He leaves, walks straight out of the ballroom with a storm cloud hovering above his head. Kendall waits through Mercedes's gushing and Griffin's congratulations and the adoration of a million strangers before he can follow, even though it's all he wants to do.
All he ever wants to do is follow James. He is bright light, and Kendall is a moth, drawn, irrevocably, no matter how wrong he knows it is.
He finds James in the atrium at the back of Griffin's house. Kendall's never been in it before, but he's passed it by, sneaking with Mercedes across the padded carpet to the kitchen or the dining room or one of the mansion's million other secret niches.
Kendall recognizes some of the herbs and flowers inside the glass room because Logan is always fooling around with new plants, trying to create something from nothing, a cure for whatever plagues whoever. James runs his fingers over some night blooming something or other, white and fragile against his big hands. Kendall's feet crunch over the pebbles, the sound echoing against the glass.
James turns, hand at the pommel of his sword, his dumb sword that the stupid councilman allowed him to keep because it's not dangerous, not like a gun.
It looks dangerous.
James looks dangerous.
He relaxes the second he sees Kendall. He tilts his head to the side and says, a little stiffly, "You should get back to your party."
"When you're throwing a temper tantrum?" Kendall crosses his arms. "Like I could."
James's forehead furrows, and why is Kendall always making him make that expression? James's fingers squeeze around the poor flower blossom until one of the petals falls to the floor. "I'm not throwing a temper tantrum."
"You're not exactly sunshine and rainbows."
"You really want me to pretend to be happy?" James is shadows. He is anger. No one else ever sees him like this, open and vulnerable, emotions churning beneath the surface of his smile.
None of the girls he trades in every night.
None of his friends at L'Amour.
Not even Logan or Carlos.
Kendall is the only one who gets to be around James when he's storm tossed and angry and upset, when he can't put on his game face with the charming smile and the tilted eyes.
"Why aren't you happy?"
"Because you're not," James replies easily.
"Does that matter?" Kendall asks feebly.
"Don't ask stupid questions."
"So I'll try to be happy. Will that change things?" Kendall reaches out, touches the downturn of James's lips. There is this tug inside his chest, strings pulled taught. He feels like James has dipped his fingers inside of him, like he is playing Kendall the same way someone else would strum a guitar. He feels big, too big, too much to hold in. He asks, "Will it make you smile again?"
James flinches, and Kendall drops his hand. The air between them is fuzzy and dark, but James's skin glows beneath the moonlight that filters through the glass roof of the atrium, like he's absorbing it.
"You're too young to get married."
"I know," Kendall agrees. James's lips thin, the shadows on his face deepening until he is all cheekbone and brow and the strong line of his nose.
He says, "It's a bad idea."
Steadily, Kendall replies, "I know."
This time, James is the one who reaches out and touches Kendall's face. He is shaking. His fingertips tremble over Kendall's skin. "I don't want you to."
"I know," Kendall says, even if he's not sure of the reason or the rationale. He presses his palm against James's chest, just to feel if his heartbeat matches the staccato rhythm of his breath. "I wish I could change it, dude. But the world is ending, and this is how-" He bites his lip, tastes blood. "This is how things have to be. It's fucking tragic."
"It's not." James shakes his head, capturing Kendall's face fully between his hands. "Look around you, Kendall. Does this look anything like the end? The world is beautiful."
James strokes his thumb against Kendall's cheekbone, and there is no light in which he will ever look anything but radiant. The moonlight and the shadows and the dim glimmer of the world outside make him glow, and there is a sweetness deep inside of Kendall, in the marrow of his bones, turning his tendons to jelly.
James makes him weak, just like that, like he is a warm, shining mess inside. Kendall brushes his mouth against the arch of James's cheekbone, nuzzling into the hollow, the curve of his nose, the place where his eyelashes fan.
Their lips brush. James's mouth makes Kendall feel tipsier than the champagne, tingly, like bubbles are fizzing against his lips. He tastes like honey vodka and sadness.
It turns rough, and quick. Kendall pops the button of the stupid starched shirt James wears, his hands brushing over the ring that James never takes off, lacing through the chain, pulling him even closer. James moans into his mouth, hitches their hips together, and for this one, terrifying moment, it's better than anything Kendall has ever experienced in his life.
Strains of music from the party pierce at Kendall's ears, but he can't hear them, can't process them, because James is a melody all his own, from the percussion drum of his heart beat to the wind instrument of his breath to the little ahahahs of his voice. When they break for air, James mouths over his throat, a wet slide emphasized by his tongue and his teeth when he nips and sucks. He marks Kendall with bruises, growls mine after deliberating over the hollow beneath Kendall's jaw, and he feels tender and raw and ridiculously turned on. He groans, and it sounds like the ringing baritone of an organ pipe, jarred and loud.
The air is thick with the scent of night blooming jasmine and James.
The heavy weight of James's dick brings him back to his senses. Kendall can feel him hot and hard against his thigh, and he wants…he wants…
Shit.
He might as well wrap his lips around the barrel of his own gun. What are they doing? This can't happen. Like this they can only exist in darkness, in hidden moments that go by too quickly.
"Stop it." Kendall pushes James away.
He doesn't want to. It's one of the most difficult things he's ever done, but this can't happen. He doesn't even know what this is.
James reaches for him, tries to rope him back in, and Kendall stutters out, "Didn't I say? Living like this is already a tragedy. You don't need to make it worse."
James stills. "What do you mean?"
"You can't repopulate anything with me. And I'm engaged. And. We-" Kendall swallows, hard. His mind is racing faster than it ever has, and Kendall is having a hard time keeping up. "We need to stay away from each other."
James pulls back his hand, hurt flashing across his face as quickly as a heat storm, here and gone in an instant. For a second, his hand hovers in the air near his own shoulder, like he's not sure what its purpose is anymore.
Then it goes to rest against the hilt of his sword.
Kendall hopes he doesn't plan on using it, really using it, for once in his life. But all James does is nod and say, "Okay," voice thick with something Kendall can't identify.
Mostly because he doesn't want to.